Getting past internet censors in China...

[ChristianAnarchist]

Ok.  Torr-project.org is one prospect.  Also I heard the commercial for patriot-internet.com and there may be other ways around it.  I do have my office computers here in the US that I can remote from China using logmein.com through my account there, but there has to be better ways...

Any ideas here would be appreciated...

[ChristianAnarchist]

Got into Hong Kong last night (after 15 hour flight from Newark) and this hotel we are in has no internet censorship that I can find so far.  Even watched a youtube clip on the Tianamen Square Massacre...

Maybe mainland will be different...

[ChristianAnarchist]

Been in Wuhan for about 10 hours now and through my in-laws DSL connection, there is censorship for sure.  Youtube is totally blocked here.  Even when I go to campaignforliberty.com and see the web pages there, any link to youtube just shows a blank window.  Clicking on the link brings up a timeout message after a minute.

I can get on BBC and so far any other sites I've tried.  Alex Jones and freetalklive are not blocked.  So far, it's only youtube and http://cryptome.cn/tk/tiananmen-kill.htm that I have found blocked.  Interestingly, the wiki page on Tianamen was not blocked.  Also  news.bbc.co.uk/ onthisday/ hi/ dates/ stories/ june/ 4/ newsid_2496000/ 2496277.stm was blocked.  It seems that they have a special hatred for youtube and anything associated with Tianamen.  Some stuff gets through, but I'm sure that if those sites begin to take a large number of hits from China, they will be assessed and blocked if determined to be in violation of their "policy"...

So now I need to determine some way to get around this violation of my rights...

[Ecolitan]

Proxy server.  Use your home computer if you have to.

[ChristianAnarchist]

Proxy server.  Use your home computer if you have to.

I have never set up a proxy server before.  If you could point me to the basics I would appreciate it.  Is it necessary to install something like winproxy or can one configure a winXP machine to be the proxy without additional software?

[Ecolitan]

I did it once.  Google told me how.  Beyond that, you need to talk to one of the bonified geeks around here.

[ChristianAnarchist]

OK so I went and downloaded psiphon proxy server and installed it on my office computer through remote log in.  I then configured my router for virtual server.  I still cannot view youtube video.  I can see the youtube page but when I click on a video I get a message saying that I have javascript disabled or do not have the flash player.  I get the same message whether I use IE or Firefox.  I even set my scriptblocker in Firefox to "allow scripts globally" and still it doesn't work.  I feel that there may be some way for the censors to block java but I don't seem to find anything about it. 

Any brainy types care to give me an idea on what else I can try???

[Dylboz]

If you can remote login to your home PC, why not just surf from home and watch it on the screen where you are? They can't do any packet sniffing when it's all tied up in the VPN stream.

[Level 20 Anklebiter]

Try TOR (The Onion Router). It's easy to setup, it's slower than snot, though.

[davann]

Go to Taiwan instead?

As a side note that I was going to bring up before, that new symbol/avatar you have was made by R3, right? Did you notice that it has the Iron Cross, a popular Nazi symbol, in it?

[rabidfurby]

As a side note that I was going to bring up before, that new symbol/avatar you have was made by R3, right? Did you notice that it has the Iron Cross, a popular Nazi symbol, in it?

sssshhhh....

[Luke Smith]

Go to Taiwan instead?

As a side note that I was going to bring up before, that new symbol/avatar you have was made by R3, right? Did you notice that it has the Iron Cross, a popular Nazi symbol, in it?

The Iron Cross is a German military symbol, not a Nazi symbol. The Iron Cross has been around in Germany forever, way before the Nazis, and still is used by the German military to this very day way after the Nazis.

[davann]

Go to Taiwan instead?

As a side note that I was going to bring up before, that new symbol/avatar you have was made by R3, right? Did you notice that it has the Iron Cross, a popular Nazi symbol, in it?

The Iron Cross is a German military symbol, not a Nazi symbol. The Iron Cross has been around in Germany forever, way before the Nazis, and still is used by the German military to this very day way after the Nazis.

Yes, yes. Very good. You is smart. The symbol itself can be traced back to German knights and it is still used by the Wehrmacht and Luftwaffe but in the States it is mostly associated with Hitler & Co. I am also fairly certain the creator did not know it has been a German symbol for a long time. I am equally as sure he inserted it simply because it was used by the Nazi.

I was merely pointing it out in case Gene did not see it.

[ChristianAnarchist]

All of which has nothing to do with censorship in China...

I did finally get "youtube" by using "patriotinternet.com" which advertises on GCN.  They are a VPN service that disguises your web presence.  Strange though that I could not get my "personal" VPN to do the same thing...

[davann]

All of which has nothing to do with censorship in China...

I did finally get "youtube" by using "patriotinternet.com" which advertises on GCN.  They are a VPN service that disguises your web presence.  Strange though that I could not get my "personal" VPN to do the same thing...

True enough.

Are you staying only in hotels or at relative's homes? If at the later are you not concerned with the possibility of getting them in trouble?